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Continuing the series of consultative workshops on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) in Pakistan, the ICIMOD office in Pakistan and the World Wide Fund for Nature-Pakistan organized two district-level workshops to consult with forest communities and other related stakeholders as a part of the ongoing REDD+ project in Pakistan.

At the workshop on Existing and Potential Approaches to Address Deforestation and Forest Degradation, held in Abbottabad, Khyber Pukhtunkhwa Province on 6 November, valuable feedback was provided during group work sessions by several Conservators of Forest in attendance, including the event’s Chief Guest Ali Asghar Khan, Chief Conservator of Forests of Hazara, as well as representatives of forest communities, the timber trade association, and civil society organizations and officials from various government departments.

The next workshop in the series, conducted in Mingora on 8 November, covered issues of the forested regions of Swat and Shangla districts and adjacent areas in Khyber Pukhtunkhwa Province. The workshop saw greater participation from forest-dependent community members than in previous workshops and was also attended by students of Swat University and representatives from civil society and government officials from various departments, including the Chief Guest, Alamgir Khan Gandapur, Chief Conservator Forests Malakand District, and other Forest Department officials.

These two workshops were the third and fourth in a series of ten workshops in various districts of Pakistan aimed at collecting the views of stakeholders on how to address drivers of deforestation and forest degradation as well as developing strategic measures. The series is a part of the REDD+ project’s preparedness phase, which is being implemented by ICIMOD-Pakistan and was jointly initiated by the Ministry of Climate Change, Government of Pakistan, ICIMOD, One UN Joint Program on Environment (JPE), and WWF-Pakistan.